So died a great artist, a great Christian, and a great gentleman, who lived, as his epitaph says, more than ninety years, not for himself, but for the good of the State. CHAPTER XII THE PROFESSIONAL MAN It is of some interest to attempt to form a picture of Wren, not as a great artist in building, but as a professional architect dealing with clients who were often awkward and sometimes dishonest, like the St. Paul’s authorities in his later years, carrying out a vast amount of detail work which is now regarded as the task of the surveyor rather than the architect, making arrangements for the settlement of disputes, boundary lines, frontages, and for compliance with Royal Proclamations and Acts of Parliament, negotiating with clients as to fees, and generally dealing with the financial and business side of his profession. All his biographers have emphasised the undoubted fact that Wren was not a self-seeking man, but I think they have a little overdone the suggestion of altruism. It is said in _Parentalia_ and elsewhere that Wren’s salary of £200 a year for the work of designing and superintending St. Paul’s was a very modest sum. That is true, but it must be remembered that the salary ran from 1675, when he was appointed Surveyor-General and Architect of St. Paul’s, until 1711, when the House of Commons determined that the Cathedral was completed. He, therefore received £7,200 in respect of St. Paul’s. It is also stated in _Parentalia_ that he received £100 a year for work on the City churches. But this seems to be wholly untrue, for Wren was paid on exactly the same basis as an architect of to-day--_i.e._, by a commission on the value of the work executed. Until 1919, when it was raised to 6 per cent., the customary remuneration of an architect in England was 5 per cent.; and a manuscript account, covering the period from July, 1670, to March, 1673, quoted by Wyatt Papworth, shows that twelve-pence in the pound for all monies received and paid was disbursed “for allowances for rebuilding the Churches to the Officers of Works for the management of the whole.” This is 5 per cent., out of which Wren no doubt paid for his office staff. As the total expenditure on the City churches was £263,786, Wren must have received over £13,000. In addition, the City authorities would now and again give to him (or in one case to Lady Wren) a lump sum by way of expressing their gratitude for his services.